Women in the 19C United States of America: American Folk Art - Bonnets & Books: America's Very Straightlaced Female Readers

Sunday, February 21, 2021

American Folk Art - Bonnets & Books: America's Very Straightlaced Female Readers

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Mrs Dodge

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Mr and Mrs William Vaughan of Aurora, Illinois

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Katherine Salisbury Newkirk Hickok, c. 1825

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Anna Gould Crand and Granddaughter Jenette 1837

Milton W. Hopkins (1789-1844) Ann Gennett Pixley Lacey (1809 - 1841)

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Unidentified Couple

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) 1824 Woman With a Shawl & Bonnet Holding Book

Milton W. Hopkins (1789-1844) Unknown Lady with Book & Shawl

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Portrait of a Woman

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Woman Holding a Book

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Lady in Black Dress Holding Book

Milton W. Hopkins (1789-1844). Fanny Aiken, 1835

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Jeanette Payne

Sheldon Peck (American painter, 1797-1868) Young Woman from New York

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Old Woman with a Bible

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) Marie Pells Phillips

William Sidney Mount (American artist, 1807–1868) Mrs Gideon Tucker 1830

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-14 1865) Wife of the Journalist

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) 1817 Mrs. Tobias Steller

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) 1824 Pauline Daring Denton

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) 1820 Sarah Mynderse Campbell

Ammi Phillips (American artist, 1788-1865) 1836 Mrs. Isaac Cox

Samuel Shaver (American artist, 1816–1878) Mrs Samuel Chastain (Elizabeth White)
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About this blog

In colonial America, men were considered superior to woman in all ways. In a strict patriarchal hierarchy, men controlled not only wealth & political power but also how their children were raised, religious questions, & all matters of right & wrong.

In the early part of the 19Cy, however, many Americans experienced a revolution in gender. The doctrine of “separate spheres” maintained that woman’s sphere was the world of privacy, family, & morality while man’s sphere was the public world -– economic striving, political maneuvering, & social competition. But women were interested in equality.

In 1848, New York passed the Married Woman’s Property Act. Now a woman wasn’t automatically liable for her husband’s debts; she could enter contracts on her own; she could collect rents or receive an inheritance in her own right; she could file a lawsuit on her own behalf. She became for economic purposes, an individual. By 1900, every state has passed legislation modeled after this, granting married women some control over their property and earnings.

In 1870 after the Civi War, the 15th Amendment was ratified, saying, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” African-Americans could vote, but women could not.

But it was not until 1920, that the 19th Amendment was ratified granting women the right to vote. “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”